Upcoming Exhibits

Two Months, Six Exhibits, One Library

Protuberance

By Jayne Reid Jackson

Adjectives Of The Road

By Kemper Smith

Katrina Schaag

Brief Bare Beautiful

By Nathan Fritz

Tchoupitoulas Street (Chef Emeril)

By Warrington Colescott

The Central Library’s September-October gallery exhibits feature six new shows. With the largest number of exhibits the library has featured thus far, these two months guarantee to further the library’s goal of celebrating ideas, promoting creativity, connecting people and enriching lives. The first five shows will hold their opening reception as part of the library’s after hours event series, NIGHT LIGHT on September 5th from 8-11pm. NIGHT LIGHT will be hosted by the Madison Storytellers on the third floor with drinks by Forequarter. Exhibits on the first and second floor will be shown from September 5th to October 30th, while the third floor space will first showcase a two week exhibit followed by a 6 week exhibit.

On the first floor, local printmaker, Jayne Reid Jackson, uses her craft to capture the intrinsic beauty of the everyday in her exhibition In Dreams. As an artist deeply rooted in the practice of drawing, Jackson utilizes the archetypes of the still life to portray common place objects in a stunning manner. Featured on the video art screen, multifaceted artist, Katie Schaag creates a multimedia experience in Fantasy/Landscape, incorporating videos, the web, and an artist book. Dealing with ways of looking at gendered power dynamics, Schaag creates an explorative backdrop for a significant, contemporary discourse.

Architect, designer, and artist, Kemper Smith dissects the novel The Road by Cormac McCarthy’s and creates a radial diagram of each adjective’s repetition and position in the book. As an installation on the second floor landing, Smith creates a digital map that confronts viewers with new ways of exploring literature. Also on the second floor, artist Nathan Fritz explores the contemporary themes of spirituality and error through multimedia collage in Bent Ambition, Confused Potential.

From September 5th to the 19th, the Madison Public Library’s collection of The Wisconsin Sesquicentennial Portfolio released by artist, printer, and publisher Andrew G. Balkin will be shown in the Diane Endres Ballweg gallery on the third floor. The Portfolio showcases prints by fifteen renowned artists all with ties to Wisconsin. Artists like Warrington Colescott, Bruce Nauman, Fred Stonehouse, and John Wilde worked toward the goal of creating “an intaglio print of such distinction as to emblazon the mark of immortality upon the 150th Birthday of Wisconsin” in 1998.

Publisher of FlakPhoto, Andy Adams is teaming up with the BUBBLER @ Madison Public Library to present a FlakPhoto Midwest Print Show held in the Diane Endres Ballweg gallery on the third floor. Coinciding with the Society for Photographic Education Midwest Conference at the University of Wisconsin-Madison campus, Center for Photography at Madison’s biennial PhotoMidwest Fest event, Madison’s annual Wisconsin Book Festival, and many other photography exhibits, talks and conferences, Andy Adams looks to curate a survey of photographers currently working and living in the American Midwest. The opening reception for the FlakPhoto Midwest Print Show will be held on September 26, from 8-10pm. The show will run until October 30th.